


into the corners of the evening

by haloud



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Tenderness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:02:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21866428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haloud/pseuds/haloud
Summary: Alex has a bad day, but then someone comes to make it better.
Relationships: Michael Guerin/Alex Manes
Comments: 21
Kudos: 205





	into the corners of the evening

Michael comes over on Fridays. It’s a standing arrangement, an inch of solid ground they’ve managed to carve out for themselves. Sometimes he cooks dinner. Sometimes Alex orders in. They play music or play cards or watch movies or make out, hands over clothes, Michael making sure to bump his knuckles across whatever bare skin he can find anyway, just like they might have if they were ever allowed to be just seventeen.

So Fridays start being the best day of the week. Even Buffy looks forward to them—the second the sun starts going down, she sits in the entryway with her ears cocked and her tail beating slowly against the floor until she hears footsteps on the stairs and picks herself up to corral Michael home. When it’s just Alex and Buffy, Alex even lets himself be eager too, smile at nothing, daydream.

Of course, then it just so happens that a Friday turns into one of the worst days in recent memory. He wakes up in stiff agony from a shitty, awful dream, early enough to be stuck staring at the pitch-black ceiling, late enough that he can’t fall back asleep. He keeps his phone and headphones on his nightstand and an array of playlists—angry, sad, happy, wistful, the works—to drive thoughts out of his head and mask noise that makes it hard to sleep, but no matter how high he turns up the volume, the dream persists, the sound of screaming, the sound of crushing bone. His stump is fucking swollen, which just fucking happens sometimes no matter how he fucking tries to take care of it, and it hurts so goddamn bad he should just stay in bed, but he goes to work anyway just to spite his own body and the universe that thinks it can tell him what to do.

Icing on the cake? When he finally grits his teeth and puts weight on his leg (with his crutch—he might be a being of pure spite, but he’s not stupid), he steps _hard_ on Buffy’s foot, making her shriek and scramble under the bed.

By the time Alex has made himself coffee and is ready to leave she’s crawled out to follow him around licking at his hands, but he still spends the whole drive to base with a death-grip on the wheel and aching at the back of his throat.

And that’s just how his _morning_ goes.

When he pulls back into his driveway that evening, he’s so bone-tired he has to close his eyes and breathe and breathe like he _breathed_ his way through physical therapy just to muster the strength to open the door and put his feet on the ground.

He fumbles his keys. Drops them. And before he knows it he’s _slammed_ his fist into the doorframe, a fast and hot expulsion of fury from his brain to his arm to his knuckles at the point of _contact._

He’s shaking when he picks them up. Unlocks the door. Lets it fall shut behind him.

Anger is the easy answer. It’s served him well damn near all his life. It lives inside him, less a tenant to his landlord, more a symbiosis. But when he collapses on his couch, shakes his hand out before cradling his head in it, he just—he just—

He should tell Michael not to come. He should ignore that little voice whispering _he only loves you because you’re_ here, _tell him no and he’ll be gone, gone_ against all evidence and faith.

He loves his anger. Keeps it, nurtures it. But still, is he—he _is—_ he’s Manes enough to fear what that anger is capable of.

Buffy pads over, her claws making little clicking noises on the floor. Michael loves that sound, has been known to lay on the floor cooing to her so she walks over to him and he can mess with her paws while she sits all prim and patient and indulging. She lays her head on Alex’s knee and blinks up at him, and he looks through his fingers back at her. Her tongue slowly peeks out—then she’s licking his jeans, soothing him the best way a dog knows how, and Alex is _inches_ from goddamn losing it.

Footsteps on the stairs. Buffy’s ears perk up, but she doesn’t move, just lets out a quiet _boof_ as Alex strokes her velvety ears.

“It’s open,” he calls out. Almost hoping he’s too quiet for Michael to hear and he’ll just…leave. Tomorrow Alex can deal with the fallout.

But no. The door swings open, and a grinning Michael, the whole mass of him, filling the doorway, taking all the air in the room with him, he steps inside and shakes out his curls like he often does when he sees Alex, like he knows, like he knows what it does to him.

“Where’s the welcoming committee—”

He cuts himself off when he sees Alex and Buffy. His grin slides off his face; his eyes go all big; his head tilts to the side. It’s not a bad Buffy impression.

“Hey,” Michael says, so softly Alex wants to _scream._

He isn’t. A person who responds to softness well. Never had it before—why should he need it now? For just a second, he misses, with a vicious, spiteful nostalgia, the jagged, rattling Guerin who’d take him on no matter what they did or said the last time, the bite and bark, they’d fuck and that would be that, that _could_ be that, he had a place within himself to put the soft things, deep in the back of his skull.

He keeps the soft things inside Michael, mostly, now. But sometimes he wishes he could snatch them back. Run and hide. Even if it meant drawing more blood.

“Hey,” Alex responds, voice carefully flat.

Michael hesitates before going to take his boots off, eyes flicking up, then down to fidget with the laces, then up again, then down, just waiting for Alex to tell him to go. Alex hates that too. Hates the echo calling him _pathetic_ in the back of his mind, needy and clinging and weak, and god, Alex is just so fucking tired. Of all of it. Of the job where he’s surrounded by people he can’t stand, constantly reminded of his father, of war, of grief and murder. Of the brain that won’t let him get a good night’s sleep and tortures him with words he’d never say out loud. Of every inch of his body that hurts, of what’s been taken from him, of the _fight_ to get it to function on days like today, clawing his bloody way up the slope.

Michael straightens back up. Rolls up onto the balls of his feet, like he might into a kiss. Nods to himself, then Alex blinks his heavy eyes, and Michael is _there,_ inches from him, eyes green and gold and warm. Alex imagines he can already feel the bathwater body heat Michael always supplies, sinking into his skin better than any heating pad or hot soak.

“Bad day?”

“You could say that.”

Buffy shifts her head on Alex’s knee; she stands, sits, licks Alex a couple more times, her eyes staring soulfully up at Michael. Michael ducks his head on a little laugh and pats her head with a _good girl._

Michael sits on the arm of the couch and slowly, so slowly, giving Alex all the time in the world to pull away, reaches over to stroke the back of his fingers against Alex’s temple. “Hey. What can I do? Anything, I’m yours.”

“Just.” Alex takes a deep breath. Can’t look at him. “I’m sorry. For whatever I do tonight. You probably shouldn’t have come. I’m going to be shit company.”

“We’re both here. I think we can make something out of that no matter the circumstances, yeah?”

How can Michael just _say_ things like that, every time? It isn’t _fair._ Especially when there are so many ways he could be proven wrong. So many ways Alex knows how to hurt him, to tear down everything they’re building.

“I’m gone if you want me gone; I’ll give you the space, but you’ve gotta say it. And it’s okay if you do. It’s not like before.”

Michael’s fingers make another slow pass, lingering this time, his thumb gentle on the shell of Alex’s ear, making him shiver at that delicate touch.

Selfish. It’s selfish to want Michael here even though he’s bound to end up snapping at him, but—would it be so bad? To be selfish? Michael is a caretaker; it’s plain in the way he is with Isobel, even when he takes it too far. It’s plain in the way he keeps candy and coloring books stashed in his Airstream for the occasional kid dragged along by a parent getting their car fixed. And it’s never been more obvious than it is right now, with him practically vibrating to be allowed to take care of Alex.

Hell, maybe this is something Alex can, in some twisted way, do for Michael, too. Make something out of this shitty day.

“I want you to stay,” he manages, voice still flat, but it makes Michael light up regardless, and hell if it isn’t worth it.

“Thank you,” Michael says, and he nuzzles in to peck their lips together. Alex doesn’t let him get away, though, and weaves his fingers into those curls to hold him close for a longer, searching kiss that has Michael _humming_ with joy by the time he pulls away. Alex could hold him tighter. Keep him in place longer. Pull him this way or that, and Michael would go. Something in Alex just settles and _purrs_ at that knowledge.

“I’ll make dinner and bring it to you. Couch or bed?”

“Hmm.” Alex twists a curl around his finger as he considers the question. It’s tempting to just go to bed, get through his nightly routine, and try and forget this day ever happened. But if he stays here on the couch, he has a clear line of sight into the tiny kitchen, where he can watch Michael cooking, hyperactive and hectic, bouncing from counter to cabinet to fridge to stove and back again, Buffy alert and bobbing and weaving at his feet for any scraps. “Couch,” he says, “but I’m not really hungry. Just…sit for a while.”

Michael obeys easily, sliding himself onto the couch beside Alex, urging him to sit back and relax with his broad, warm hand rubbing across Alex’s shoulders and back, taking the tension there with him.

“Go ahead and take your leg off,” he says, eyes shining, “I’ll take care of it. You. Everything.”

So Alex does, and by the time he’s done, a glass of water and a bottle of painkillers has arrived on the side table. Alex takes two, and then Michael coaxes him into laying his legs over his lap, his one hand gently stroking the remainder leg, mindful of its sensitivity and swelling, and the other massaging his sore foot. So talented with his hands Alex tips his head back, lets his eyes shut, and groans his approval.

Minutes later, he opens his eyes again, and he sees—

Michael in profile, his curls messy across his forehead, his eyes hooded as he looks down to watch himself work, soothing a pain Alex hadn’t even realized he was carrying. So content he’s almost smug. A little smile on his face. It’s so simple, a tiny act of love, of service, but it makes a _change_ in Michael. Makes him softer. And this time, anger left sated and silent within him, Alex can be happy about that.

The electric kettle goes off in the kitchen, sudden and hissing, and Alex jumps at the sound.

“Just me,” Michael murmurs, stroking his hand up to Alex’s hip, looking up at him through his lashes with that same contented smile. A couple moments later, a mug floats out of the kitchen and into Alex’s hands. His favorite tea. His favorite mug—one Maria made for him at one of those paint your own dish birthday parties when they were eight. And Michael, bending over to kiss the back of his hand, not even asking for a _thank you._

“I.” Alex has to cough, take a swallow of tea, or else he might get choked up. “Had a really bad day.”

It’s stupid—Alex feels a little stupid for repeating himself. Like it’s not obvious. Like he’s some little kid begging for reassurance.

But Michael just says, “Yeah.” And leans over to mush a kiss to Alex’s shoulder, still cradling his legs so carefully in his lap so Alex doesn’t get jostled by his movement. “Thank you for letting me share this part of it. And maybe do a little bit to make the night less shit.”

And Alex strokes his hair, pets him ‘til he’s purring, sleepy eyes still alert enough to watch Alex with fond focus.

“You have,” he says, “you already have.”


End file.
